Skip to Content
Streetsblog USA home
Streetsblog USA home
Log In
Climate Change

Your Burger or Your Car! (And More Fun with False Dichotomies)

The Washington Post's Ezra Klein, whose blog is a must-read look at the political dynamics of congressional policy-making, makes an eyebrow-raising assertion in his food column today:

homecoming.jpeg(Photo: CowCar)

It's not simply that meat is a contributor to global warming; it's that it is a huge contributor. Larger, by a significant margin, than the global transportation sector.

Really? Klein cites a 2006 report by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, which found that the livestock industry -- the process of bringing meat from farm to table -- generates 18 percent of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions "measured in CO2 equivalent."

Transportation, according to the UN report, generates 13.5 percent of global emissions measured by the same method.

And that's an important caveat. Two gases produced in large quantities by livestock are methane and nitrous oxide, which have 23 times and 296 times the "global warming potential" of CO2. Measuring methane and nitrous oxide in "CO2 equivalent," then, pads the climate impact of livestock versus CO2 emitters such as cars and power plants.

The 2006 UN report's comparison rings hollow in another way as well. Measuring the movement of feed to factory farms, not to mention the movement of packaged meat to supermarket shelves, means that livestock is part of the world's transportation sector, not a separate and distinct source of emissions.

Later in his column, Klein also cites a University of Chicago study that found adopting a vegan diet would be healthier for the environment than driving a hybrid car. As Dan Lasher of the Natural Resources Defense Council discovered, however, the Chicago researchers drastically underestimated the amount of CO2 released by one gallon of gas, among other "generic calculations."

So what's the lesson? Cutting down on burger consumption could be a positive choice that also helps the environment. But setting up false dichotomies that suggest gas-guzzlers can be mitigated by salads, that's pretty unhealthy.

Stay in touch

Sign up for our free newsletter

More from Streetsblog USA

Friday’s Headlines Transform and Roll Out

Will autonomous vehicles really make us safer? Maybe in the long run, but maybe not in the short run.

May 23, 2025

Talking Headways Podcast: When You Don’t Really Need an Ambulance

Let's talk about the realities of non-emergency medical transportation, long a quiet backwater of urban transport planning.

May 22, 2025

Thursday’s Headlines Are Open 24 Hours

Between an egg surcharge and now EV chargers, late-night diner chain Waffle House looks ready to thrown down with the Trump administration.

May 22, 2025

How A Single Transportation Emergency Can Keep Parents From Achieving Their College Dreams

Abigail Seldin of Scholarship America about the 3.8 million U.S. students who are earning degrees while raising families.

May 22, 2025

Republican Senators Press Attack on CA’s Clean Air Laws

Anyone hoping that Congressional Republican leaders would follow generations of precedent regarding the role of the non-partisan Senate Parliamentarian or the Government Accountability Office (GAO) had a very bad day yesterday.

May 21, 2025

What It’s Like to Grow Up Car-Free In Chicago

"There's a good mix of time where you don't want your parents to drop you off, but you have to, because you don't have your own car," Quetzal said. "I never had that."

May 21, 2025
See all posts